Google Widens Search Appliance Reach Through iWay Adapters

Published: May 23, 2006

by Alex Woodie

iWay Software and Google have hooked up to help users get at back-end data sources. The new partnership announced last week leverages iWay's vast store of adapters and connectors to provide Google OneBox for Enterprise customers with real-time access to data housed in ERP, CRM, and other back-end systems.

It was just a matter of time before Google targeted the enterprise in a serious way. It has done that with OneBox for Enterprise, a new software option Google added to its Search Appliance that enables users to get access to reports, such as graphs of inventory levels and sales trends--to "Google" their enterprise applications, in effect.

When it launched in April, Google had a core collection of OneBox for Enterprise customers providing the back-end connectivity, including Cisco, Cognos, Oracle, Salesforce.com, and SAS. That list of ERP connections grew exponentially with the addition of iWay to the roster. iWay, which is an Information Builders company, specializes in this field and claims to have a roster of more than 300 adapters, to a range of applications, databases, and legacy systems, including OS/400, DB2/400, 5250 emulation, J.D. Edwards, and more.

Being able to "Google" these sources for information will appeal to people, predicts John Senor, president of iWay Software. "It provides a new way to give people relevant information from any information system during the course of their normal search operations," he says.

The iWay Universal Adapter Suite supports a single module for Google OneBox for Enterprise. It will ship at the end of May. Pricing starts at $15,000.